BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati will meet Syria's de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus on Saturday, two Lebanese sources said, becoming the first head of government to visit Syria's capital since the fall of Bashar al-Assad.

Intelligence officials in Syria’s new de facto government say they have thwarted a plan by the Islamic State group to set off a bomb at a Shiite shrine in the Damascus suburb of Sayyida Zeinab.

The fall of the Assad regime will have a substantial impact on Lebanese politics, highlighting border tensions, refugee challenges, and Hezbollah’s influence. Normalization with Damascus depends on Lebanon’s domestic politics,

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati arrived in Damascus Saturday in the first such visit since before civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, an AFP journalist reported.

Lebanon's Prime Minister Najib Mikati will on Saturday make his first official trip to neighbouring Syria since the fall of president Bashar al-Assad, his office told AFP.

Lebanon’s Mikati and Syria’s al-Sharaa discuss relations, including smuggling between countries and border challenges.

Syria was the dominant power in Lebanon for three decades under the Assad family, with President Hafez al-Assad intervening in its 1975-1990 civil war and his son Bashar al-Assad only withdrawing Syria's troops in 2005 following mass protests triggered by the assassination of Lebanese ex-Prime Minister Rafic Hariri.

The visit by Prime Minister Najib Mikati was the first official trip by the Lebanese leader to meet with the new government of Syria.

Najib Mikati’s visit, the first in 15 years, comes amid pressure in Lebanon to release Islamists imprisoned during the civil war and just after the election of President Joseph Aoun.

Syria's de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa met Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati in Damascus on Saturday in a bid to improve long-fraught ties, with the pair focusing on strengthening their shared border.

For instance, a member of the Iranian Expediency Council said on Wednesday, “The Palestinian resistance movement emerged victorious in the Gaza war and stands ready to confront the occupying Israeli regime in due time,

Gabbard’s 2017 trip to Syria, where she met with authoritarian leader Bashar al-Assad, is expected to be a focus of questions from senators weighing her nomination to be director of national intelligence.